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GLG Partners, the London-based hedge fund manager, has reported a 54.8% drop in net revenues, according to its second quarter results, its last with prominent fund manager Greg Coffey on board.

In the first half overall, GLG lost $1.82bn through its funds' performance.

Noam Gottesman, chairman and chief executive of GLG, said that, in July, its hedge funds lost on average 3.6% on a dollar-weighted basis, which decreased slightly to a 2.9% loss when one excluded performance of the emerging markets hedge funds Coffey runs.

"Our [funds'] dollar-weighted performance was down 2.4% in the first half of 2008 and down 0.5% for the second quarter of 2008," Gottesman said. "If one excludes the Emerging markets hedge fund on a dollar-weighted basis, hedge funds were down 0.8% for the first half of 2008, and up 2.3% for the second quarter of 2008."

Gottesman said investors had already given GLG about $2.2bn worth of redemption requests for the emerging markets hedge funds Coffey manages, and the firm expected to receive $3bn to $4bn of redemptions in total.

He added Coffey's Emerging markets hedge fund needed to make about $744m before reaching its high watermark, which is the level at which a hedge fund can levy a performance fee on existing investors.

GLG reported that net revenues and other income fell from $418m in the second quarter last year to $188.8m in the second quarter of this year, a 54.8% fall. Its second half net revenues fell by 34.8% to $320.2m from $491m in the same period last year.

The New York-listed firm said today that its net loss - according to generally agreed accounting principles (GAAP) before minority interests - for the first half of 2008 was $307.71m, compared with a $138.57m gain in the first half of 2007.

The performance fees GLG earned in the second quarter of this year fell 77% to $78.2m, from $340.5m in last year's corresponding period. It noted that it generally recognised performance fees when they crystallised on June 30 and December 31, so its second quarter performance fees this year "largely reflect crystallised performance for the first half of the year".

GLG's first half performance fees this year declined 75.8%, from $343m in the first half of last year, to $82.9m.

The group has also seen $629m of net redemptions in the second quarter of 2008.

While GLG said that it grew its assets by 27% to $23.7bn in the 12 month period to June 30 2008, overall assets GLG managed on June 30 fell by 4% since the end of the first quarter. However Gottesman said the $3bn mandate GLG had won from the asset management division of Italian private bank Banca Fideuram was expected to begin providing money for GLG in third or fourth quarter of 2008.

Gottesman said GLG's recent high profile recruiting had "laid the foundation for a new global macro platform and underscored our ongoing commitment to emerging markets".

GLG hired four senior managers in July. They were Driss Ben-Brahim, a former partner at investment bank Goldman Sachs, who will develop macro and special situation platforms for GLG; Karim Abdel-Motaal and Bart Turtelboom, who will join GLG from investment bank Morgan Stanley to replace Coffey as co-heads of GLG's Emerging markets fund, the Emerging currency and fixed income fund and the Emerging equity fund; and Jamil Baz, from fixed income manager Pimco, who will be GLG’s chief investment strategist.